“Ah, husbands are what most seek in coming to me. Pardon me, but I must mollify my poor Cleopatra or she will allow me no sleep tonight.” Bast walked away and stopped. “Your humility belies an arrogance, Sitt Fatima, but no matter, you will soon grow wiser. You should have asked for my counsel, but I will give it anyway. Rise, Fatima, and leave quickly. Time is of the essence. What you have to face, you must face alone, or others will be hurt. Leave your home city. It is not time for you to be back here. You will not be a slave for long if you make the correct choices, and the correct choices are always the most difficult ones.” She took a deep breath, lowered her head, stared at the floor, then looked back at Fatima, who no longer recognized the woman in front of her. The healer’s hair began to unfurl, and the air surrounding her head began to shimmer and sparkle. “Show me your hand,” Bast commanded. Fatima stepped toward her, but the healer held her palm out. “Stop. Show me your palm.” Fatima raised the palm of her left hand, and Bast recoiled. “Fatima’s hand. Leave now, quickly, and have courage.”
Bast turned away. “Here, kitty. Come here, Cleopatra.”
And the three travelers left Alexandria in a hurry. “Could we not have spent the day and seen the sights?” Jawad asked. “Seems a shame. I have never been to any city but my own. Khayal says the lads in Alexandria wear no underpants.”
“It is true,” Fatima said. “But I could not linger. We must make haste.”
For seven days, they rode with little rest, until they had crossed most of the Sinai. For seven days, Fatima felt her doom follow her, but spoke nothing of it. She heard the earth thump a rhythm that matched her heart’s. They rode into the deserts of Palestine.
“We cannot keep up this pace, Sitt Fatima,” Jawad said. “The horses cannot make it without a rest. We must ease up, or none will survive and neither will we.”
Fatima reluctantly agreed. They set up camp before the sun set. And she waited.
Fatima heard her name being called from below. She heard the low rumble before the lovers did, before the pack animals. She felt the tremor beneath her feet, and, as if her soles had ears, she heard the sand speak: “Fatima, I come for you, Fatima.”
The horses whinnied. The noise grew louder; the earth shook. The camels fled. Two untied mares joined them. Jawad seemed to struggle. His instinct was to try and corral them, but he was petrified. The mules stood still. That stillness — there was a moment of it, of unequivocal tranquillity, only an instant — and then the earth exploded. Between Fatima and the two lovers a hole yawned, spewing a hot yellow fire. The flames flickered here and there, but did not change color. Unnatural, they were like giant fronds of an anemone. A giant blue head appeared, the fire its hair. The jinni glared with three red eyes and growled, showing two rows of daggerlike teeth.
“Save yourselves,” cried Fatima to Jawad and Khayal. Yet she herself remained rooted.
His putrid stench would have suffocated an infant — the smell of months-old eggs, rotting garbage, and decaying flesh. Hundreds of black crows picked at his teeth for bits of food. They flew in and out of his nose, looked like flies because of his size. The hides of seven rhinos made up his loincloth. He wore a necklace of human skulls that hung to his navel, with two loops around his neck like a pearl collar. Through the space between his legs, she could see Jawad and Khayal fleeing.
“So — I am supposed to be a plaything of yours?” His voice poured forth, slow and sibilant, dripping like unsweetened molasses.
She waited until Jawad disappeared behind the jinni’s thigh before replying, “I offer you my sincere apologies, sire. I meant you no disrespect. It was said to escape certain death. We were waylaid. I had no other choice.”
“It was a boast,” he shouted, with a force that shook everything within leagues.
“It was silly. Anyone can tell you are no one’s plaything. Why, look at you. You are so grand and powerful, and I am nothing but a helpless maiden. Who would believe what I said?”
“Quiet.” His voice almost knocked Fatima over. “You think your wit will save you this time?” He opened his hands, and ten red fingernails sprang out, ten swords, each as tall as she was. “I want to smell your fear, woman. I am Afreet-Jehanam.” His blue chest puffed out. “Tremble.”
“I have forgotten how.” She took out her sword, held it steadily in front of her.
He laughed. The jinni struck with the nails of his thumb and forefinger, and she scampered away, moved the sword from her right hand to her left, ran toward her attacker. But he was Afreet-Jehanam. He nonchalantly flicked his pinkie and chopped off her hand. She fell to her knees. Looked at her sword-clutching left hand on the ground in front of her. Her wrist sprayed blood. She clutched it with her right arm. Raise it above heart level, she remembered, raise it above heart level. Would it matter?
“Tremble,” he said.
“Kill me.”
He shrugged. He raised a finger. She closed her eyes. She heard the sound of metal hitting metal. Opened her eyes. Jawad was on his back, his sword next to him. “Is today some kind of day of fools?” the jinni asked. “Am I to be attacked by pests?” Khayal arrived running and stopped between Jawad and the jinni, who said, “Yes, definitely the day of dying fools.” He raised his arm with its five finger-swords to strike.
“Stop,” Fatima yelled. “You have no quarrel with them. I am the one you want.”
“This one tried to attack me from behind. He must die. They both must.”
“Spare them. Look at the boy. He has just discovered love. Look into his eyes. Do not end his happiness. Be merciful, sire. He has just begun to live. Kill me, not them.”
The jinni considered the situation. He raised an arm to the heavens. The crows flew up, circled his lethal fingernails. He moved his arm, and they shot out like javelins into the empty sky. When he brought his arm back down, he announced, “I will not kill the lovers.” The crows began a descent, flew as if they were a flock of black pigeons. “I will not end your life, either, for you are not worthy of being killed by me.” He picked up Fatima’s hand from the dusty ground where it lay and used her sword as a toothpick, sucking the gaps between his teeth, producing a thunderous noise, savoring the taste of his mouth, smacking his lips. “You have begun to bore me. I had expected a better fight. It will be much more entertaining to hear you try to explain how your plaything left you without a hand.” He walked toward the crater in the ground. “Much more fun to watch you muddle handless through your ignoble life.” He stepped into the hole. “If you think you are worthy of being killed by my hand, come to my world and claim yours.” He chortled as his head disappeared. “I am sure you will be able to find your way to the plaything.”
Jawad, sweating from exertion and the sun’s harsh rays, rushed to check on Fatima’s arm. He tore off his sleeve and tied it around the bleeding wrist. He began to tear off his other sleeve, but Fatima stopped him. She pushed the silver bracelets around her arm farther up. When she could not push anymore, Khayal took over. The rings acted as a tourniquet.
“We must leave,” Khayal said. “You may not be fit to be moved, but we have no choice.”
“The jinni might return,” Jawad said.
“Go,” she said, her voice labored, her breathing shallow. “I must travel a different path. Leave now. Linger not.”
“You cannot make it on your own,” Jawad said. “You are weak. Where do you wish to go, in any case? We must run away from here.”
She attempted to stand up, faltered, swayed, and sat back down. “I must retrieve my hand. Leave me.” She placed her only hand on Khayal’s shoulder and used him as leverage to lift herself. “Tell the emir I met my doom.” She did not sway. “Or tell him I will be back soon. Or choose not to return. Find your own place in this world. Take care of each other. Either way. I must descend.” She looked into the crater. “Now, be a good boy,” she said to Jawad, “and find me a staff. The yucca there would do.”